Thursday, March 19, 2015

Ghana: Electoral body lays new CI in parliament over botched local elections

The Electoral Commission of Ghana is expected to lay before Parliament today, a new Constitutional Instrument (CI) which will guide the conduct of the District Assembly Elections.

According to the chairman of the Local Government Committee of Parliament, Dominic Azumah Azimbe, the electoral body put finishing touches to the document Monday and forwarded it to the Attorney General “and that department has been working on the draft since Monday.”

It will take a period of 21 days for the CI to mature before Parliament will pass it to empower the Afari Gyan-led EC to go ahead with the District Assembly Elections.

The local polls that were expected to come off early March were declared “unconstitutional” following a Supreme Court ruling in favour of a fisherman who was unlawfully disqualified from contesting because there was no CI backing the elections.

Speaking to Accra-based Citi FM, Azimbe said because the House will rise on March 27 and resume in May, the Local Government Committee has recommended a recall of MPs after the Easter Holidays to enable the CI to mature in time for the elections to be held in July.

About Ghc310 million of state funds was spent on the botched district assembly elections and the EC is demanding an extra Gh¢90 m to organise fresh elections.


Source: Ghana/starrfmonline.com/103.5FM

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